Reminiscence
by Caelestis Kibeth
Summary: SORATO When Sora attempts suicide and is stopped by her ex-boyfriend, Yamato, he realizes that the choices he made to help her, only hurt her more in the end.
1. Prologue: Leaving It All Behind

**Reminiscence**

**Prologue : Dear Diary**

**By : Caelestis Dulcis**

_Dear Diary,_

_ Sometimes I wonder if it was all even worth the struggle the both of us went through, just to end up where we are right now. Why did we stick through everything to have it all fall apart in the end? What was worth having the world crumble at our feet when we thought--or _I _thought, as he seems to have had a different idea the whole time--that nothing could separate us, when we thought that we were finally in a safe haven? Why did I even go so far as to delude myself in thinking that things would work out dating a rock star?_

_ He had never treated me as anything too very special before, so was I wrong to push aside the feeling I had that things were happening too abruptly to make any sense? Even though he never told me the real reason for leaving me, looking back on things with new, unclouded eyes, I can only give my full-hearted assumption that this is exactly what was going on. He couldn't have really cared about my feelings in the first place, because, when, really, before that night, had he even given me a second glance? Sure, he was one of my best friends, he always cared more about me than about the girls in his fanclub and whatnot, but that's not the sort of glance I'm talking about. I mean the _real _sort. The sort you hear about in books, the sort that someone who really loves you gives you. Those _special _glances. No, never anything like that. At least, nothing he had ever cared enough to let me see._

_ I was stupid in the first place to trust with my heart a person like him, a person who I knew played and deluded a different girl every other day. Just as he deluded me. Did I think that just because he was my friend that he would have any special concern for the fragility of my heart, my soul, my whole being that I gave to him so trustingly? I was too caught up in what I had been wishing for for so long. I was so caught up in this wonderful dream that I couldn't see clearly what was so obviously looming ahead--our inevitable separation. As cliche as it sounds, I had loved him from the moment I met him. You can call me stupid, idiotic, ignorant, whatever, Diary, but what would you have done if a person like that finally seemed to take notice in you, asked _you _out after so long?_

_ After everything, I still love him, so much that it hurts sometimes to think about it. Don't ask me how I can love him after he broke my soul like that, don't ask me how I can still love the person that tore out my heart, but I do. I really do. I don't know if anything will ever change that, or, as common teen-angst as it sounds, if I'll ever get over him, ever forget him. He was--_is_--too special to just be thrown aside. But that's why I'm writing to you this very last time, dear Diary. Even though I will be gone, I want my memories of him to remain here, on the mortal coil, for my friends to know--and maybe even him. Then he, as well as I, and our struggles, will never be forgotten...Then the world, and his ungrateful self will know how hard his blows hit._

_ And with these last words, and these precious trinkets, I leave you. You will serve your purpose now, as I have served mine. As a very wise person once told me, 'With your spirit, you can soar to the sky...'_

_4.13.04 Takenouchi Sora_

Closing the book, the auburn-haired girl allowed her fingers to linger on the leather-bound cover, tracing over the gold lettering for just the breifest of moments. Her hands then moved from the desk to the back of her neck and, pushing her tresses aside, she unlatched a silver chain upon which a beautifully ornate heart locket hung. She didn't bother to unlatch it, for simply knowing what was inside was enough to make her try to cry the tears long gone. Sora did not bother to look at what she was doing when she slipped a gold band, inscribed with _'Love and Friendship...Forever', _off her left ring finger either. Instead, she carefully laid them upon the book and turned to the window, not taking a second glance back to her precious possessions.

The pure white curtains blew in the early afternoon breeze, silkily gliding across her face, licking like flame at her cheeks as she stared, almost dazed, at the busy street below her. Sora did not hesitate for more than a millisecond; she was so very sure of what she needed to do, more sure than she had ever been of anything in her life...save one.

A bare foot raised in front of her, as if of its own will, and took a firm grip on the window ledge. The rest of her body followed suit, until she was squatting, balanced on the windowsill, teetering nearly a hundred feet from the traffic-filled ground that was the base to the building she was in. Closing her eyes, and taking a deep breath, Sora decided that she was not afraid; she would not die a death knowing that she was afraid of it. That just wasn't the sort of girl that she was.

She began to lean over, her hands clutching the sides of the sill tightly, until she was barely balancing by her feet anymore. Her heart racing--not because of fear, but because of excitement--she let go with one of her hands, feeling the air rush across her face and throwing her hair askew. The grip of her other hand lessened...and lessened...and...

"Sora! Stop!"

Shocked by the sudden break in her almost meditative-state, she screamed and fell off the edge, barely allowing her the time to regain a firm grip with her hand on the sill. Yamato ran over to the window frantically, while people on the ground below emitted shocked gasps at the sight of the young teenager hanging with one hand above them. Some whispered to each other excitedly things like, '_What in the world does that idiot think she's doing, pulling a stunt like that? She could be killed!' _and _'What in the world could have driven that poor girl to try jumping out a window?' _while others just stared in astonishment, completely silent, as if even the slightest breath could cause her to slip.

Yamato leaned over the open window, his coveted blonde locks for once forgotten as they whipped dangerously across his face in the wind. With an iron arm and determined seriousness in his deep ocean eyes, he grabbed a hold of his friend's arm and pulled as hard as he possibly could. Creases and sweat appeared on his brow with the strain of her weight on his one limb as he attempted to use all his strength to rescue Sora from the side of the building. It didn't help that she was dead weight, not giving any effort to help herself.

It puzzled him as to why, but the blonde boy didn't contemplate it for more than a mere moment. First save Sora, then ask questions. He didn't know that, at the time, in her mind, he was condemning her back into her living hell. Not saving her. However, there was nothing she could do about it. He had the grip around her, not the other way around, and she couldn't let go, nor did she have the emotional strength to. She didn't know what it was, but there was something about his touch that made her freeze, that kept her from wriggling out of his grasp. And eventually, even without her help, he succeeded, grabbing her around the waist and carrying her through the window as if she were a damsel in distress.

Sighing in relief, Yamato set her down on her own two shaky feet, but, as gentle has he had been, he felt a white-hot rage permeate his mind, and his attitude towards her changed in the space of a millimeter. The next thing he knew, he had Sora forcefully pushed up against her bedroom wall, the bottoms of his palms digging so deeply into the skin of her shoulders that she was lifted a couple centimeters off the creamy-white carpet. He would surely leave bruises there for a while.

Sora winced slightly at his ferocity, but remained silent, staring at him blankly with emotionless, pained cinnamon-coloured eyes. The loss of the spark that they had harbored before came as such a shock that it almost fazed the boy...almost.

"What the _fuck_ did you think you were doing!?" he roared in a voice she had only heard him use with Taichi. That voice had always frightened her before, but now it didn't so much. She was feeling too numb at the moment to even care what tone he took up with her. "What in the _hell_ is going on inside of that head of yours, you stupid bitch!?"

Even since they broken up, Sora had never heard him address her with such harsh terms...but she supposed that he had every right to be angry with her. _I have just as much right to be angry with him as well! _a little voice told her. _I never asked him to run in and play the hero!_

Yamato hadn't expected her to speak--the look in her eyes made him wonder if she was even listening--so it took him by surprise when she retaliated back, kicking at him with her suspended legs frantically, her arms trying to squirm away from his rough grasp on her. "Why do you care!?" she screamed. "Just leave me the hell alone, Yamato! No one asked you to come 'save' me, so just screw off and leave me to my own business!"

Before he could retort with another violent lecture, one of the kicks landed straight on his stomach and the teenager stumbled back, gasping for air. Sora hadn't expected the kick to hit and was thus unprepared when she fell back down to earth, causing her to trip rather uncremoniously into a heap on the floor.

They both recovered quickly, at about the same time, and Sora made a mad dash for the window again. Somewhat suspecting that she would do this, Yamato reached out just in time and grabbed both of her arms, holding them paralyzed behind her back. As he became more sure of the control that he was gaining, he pulled her closer and closer into his body, until her bare arms were brushing up against his black satin shirt. Then, in one lithe and swift movement, he spun her around to face him, his hold changing from her wrists to the sides of her arms.

"Oh no," he threatened in a dangerously low hiss. "You're not pulling that stunt on me again, Sora. You're going to stay still and tell me what the fuck is going on."

The auburn-haired beauty stared fearfully into his bottle blue eyes, fresh as if he had just woken up from a nap. They clashed horribly with hers, bloodshot with bags pulling them down, from the obvious lack of sleep that she had been getting. They stayed just like that, portraying pain, hurt, betrayal through their orbs for a long time before he got fed up with the silence. He shook her from anger, out of frustration, back and forth, hoping to get her to say something, anything to him. When he stopped, she still said aboslutely nothing.

She collapsed into his familiar arms and sobbed.

**A/N:** How'd everyone like the prologue? It leaves you somewhat in suspense, or at least I hope it does. I can't begin writing the first chapter until Thursday or so, because I'll be on vacation starting Saturday, but I'll try to get it up as soon as I can. In the meantime, motivate me to writer faster by reviewing! An author is nothing without support!

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Digimon. This will serve as the disclaimer for all chapters to come as well as this one. So don't bug me about it later, ya got it right here!


	2. Chapter One: Friendship

****

**Reminiscence**

**Chapter One : Friendship**

**By : Caelestis Dulcis**

****

_"Oh no," he threatened in a dangerously low hiss. "You're not pulling that stunt on me again, Sora. You're going to stay still and tell me what the fuck is going on."_

_The auburn-haired beauty stared fearfully into his bottle blue eyes, fresh as if he had just woken up from a nap. They clashed horribly with hers, bloodshot with bags pulling them down, from the obvious lack of sleep that she had been getting. They stayed just like that, portraying pain, hurt, betrayal through their orbs for a long time before he got fed up with the silence. He shook her from anger, out of frustration, back and forth, hoping to get her to say something, anything to him. When he stopped, she still said absolutely nothing._

_She collapsed into his familiar arms and sobbed._

Yamato glanced down at the sobbing Sora in his arms rather uneasily. First off, he didn't really know how to deal with a crying girl, no matter who it was. Second, this wasn't just anyone, this was his ex-girlfriend. It felt ackward with her being this closely pressed up against him after what seemed like forever and a day away from her. Keeping in mind that he had just gotten done chewing her out and throwing some properly nasty obscenities at her, he uncertainly wrapped his arms loosely around the redhead's shuddering form.

When she did not push him away, Yamato's confidence scale went up just a little bit and he ran his right hand soothingly in circles on her back. "Come on, Sora," he whispered, his voice a lot softer and more concerned than before. "Calm down, _please_...I didn't mean what I said. I'm just in shock...Stop crying; tears don't befit you at all."

She shook her head, the cool satin of his shirt flowing along her forehead gently. Sora coughed slightly, in an effort to dislodge the tears seemingly welling up in her throat instead of her eyes. "It's-It's not that," she said, her voice sounding strangled. "Y-You have every right to be angry with me. Who wouldn't be...if they found their friend trying to-trying to...kill herself?" That was Sora, being blunt. She never did like it when people fretted over her, and she was obviously, to Yamato at least, trying to keep him from getting too concerned by being open with it herself.

She went into a small coughing fit again, and it took a minute for her to regain her poise--or at least as much poise as she could have with tears streaming down her face. "I'm just...so stressed out. It's been eating me up...for weeks. I haven't been able to cry like this...s-since that...that day..." She didn't dare speak aloud the words 'the day we separated.'

And she didn't have to.

Yamato's eyes went wide and he pushed her away from him, still keeping a grip on her shoulders. His shocked eyes surveyed her features; her tearstained cheeks, slightly puffy eyes, fatigued orbs, and tousled red hair, all beautiful even in their depressing qualities. He stood like that for a long time, he supposed, just staring at her like he had never seen the woman in front of him in his life. It must have taken him minutes to speak, all the while adding to the tension already so thick that it was palpable.

"Is that...is that why?" he whispered, a whisper almost as strangled as her tone had been, in an attempt to keep his own from shattering. All the while he was thinking, _Please say I didn't do this to you, Sky. Please say I didn't make you do that...Tell me that I'm not the one to blame here..._

Of course, it would be so much more simple if someone else had driven her to this point. It was so much easier to go out and beat someone to a pulp for hurting her than it was to accept the fact that it was he, himself, who had done the initial hurting. Yamato was never good with taking the guilt for anything, it was always so much easier to blame it on someone else. However, the heavy guilt was upon his chest from the very moment that she nodded her head. A simple motion it was, really, to be able to make someone feel so horrible about themselves. But it had so quickly caused the man's stomach to drop through the floor, to make his heart ache like it never had before, and to make him want to go off and bring himself physical pain. He wanted so badly right now to make himself suffer.

He wanted to...but he knew that he couldn't.

Sora wouldn't have him beating himself up for her sake. She just wasn't that sort of person, that liked to have her vengeance. She deserved it, but she didn't want it and in the end, it would just hurt her more.

Yamato had been so consumed in his own thoughts that Sora's soft hand interlocking with his came as a suprise, and he almost jumped. "We need to talk, Yamato," she told him softly, and he noticed that she was no longer crying. "We _really_ need to talk." She wanted to speak with him after a long three months of being alone. She wanted to curl into a ball in his arms and tell him that she missed him. She wanted to give him a very large and very disgusted piece of her mind. But more than anything, she just wanted to know _why_... Either way, she needed to know. Did he leave her because he didn't love her and, if not that, then why? _Why_? The one word that had been etched into the back of her mind, agitating her thoughts and thrusting her into a very large-scale state of depression, was the source of all her problems. Not knowing was worse than dealing with the fact that he had left in the first place.

Silently, he nodded his head and lead her out of the bedroom and into the living room, that living room that was just as familiar to him as she, herself was. He loved that apartment, but at the same time, being in it gave him a horrible feeling that he couldn't explain. He knew, though, that it had something to do with the memories that those cool blue walls held. And he also knew that the house wouldn't make him feel so low as he felt if he had never left the security and peace that they once offered to him.

Sighing, Sora leaned back into the black, overstuffed leather cushions and closed her eyes. While his presence brought her uneasiness and unhappiness, it still held that miraculous power to calm her down and her frantically swirling emotions that had been there before were somewhat compressed for the time being. She wasn't stupid or naive enough to think that the pain was over, but was content for the moment just sitting on an emotional plateau. She felt the left half of her body lower a little closer to the ground and felt a gentle hand rest itself on her bare shoulder. "So," the voice belonging to the hand's body spoke out, "are you planning on telling me what made you think I didn't love you, Sora?"

Her cinnamon eyes shot open and she took in his solemn face all at once. "How did you...know?"

"I'm more than just a good-looking, famous, richer-than-dirt rock star, love. I'm a lot more intelligent than you think, and even so, it doesn't take a genius to put the pieces together," he said, attempting a joke to lighten the mood. Everything would be a lot easier for the both of them to talk about if they got rid of some of this annoying tension. Luckily, she went along with him. Of course, it wasn't like he doubted that she would do anything it took to stop his concern; at least, some of it. He had learned a lot about her from not only being around her for so long, but partly from listening to his amazingly observant little brother.

"You're such a diva, Ishida," Sora said, rolling her eyes slightly. He winced when he noticed that the sorrow was still evident, and mentally promised himself that he would try to avoid eye contact with her for a while. It was a lot more than he was prepared to take. There was a moment of uneasy silence that ensued between them, and the joke was lost amidst the lack of either's voice. He had been stupid to think that it would work in the first place.

"A-Anyway," he stuttered a little, staring at the couch like it was the most interesting thing in the world, "I think that the best thing we could do is to start telling the story from the beginning...from _both _of our perspectives, not just yours...As much as we were there for each other, I don't think that we really understood each other at all. You've got things horribly wrong, Sora...I want to know how you could even think for a minute that I.." he trailed off, the rest of the words not needing to be spoken.

"Well, riddle me this, Yamato," Sora exploded all at once, suddenly very angry. "How could I not? If you remember it like I do, _you _were the one that left _me_ in the middle of the night with nothing but a goddamn note and your money! What would you think of our relationship if I did that to you!?"

His breath caught in his throat and he wasn't able to retort as he wanted to. He had never thought of that...how _would _he have felt if their roles had been switched? He had never stopped to think of what he would feel like, waking up with just a short scribbled note explaining nothing as to why she had left or as to where...just that she had left and didn't know if or when she was coming back. And then, he realized with a start, had he ever even _cared _about how he was hurting her? Or was it as he knew it was? Did he do it only out of his selfish cowardice?

He couldn't deny it, as much as he told himself that it had been all for her sake. He couldn't deny that he had allowed a few casual words to scare him into running away...however, he wouldn't accept it. He wouldn't accept that he was a coward, he wouldn't accept that he had brought that sadness to her eyes, and he wouldn't accept that leaving her amounted to a situation worse than any that would have come had he just sucked it up and stayed by her side.

"Look Sora," he finally said with a sigh. He closed his eyes for a long moment. "Yelling isn't going to get us anywhere. Let's just try to sort this all out." Of course, he knew where the real problem lied, but that didn't mean that he was going to tell her that it was his fault...His ego needed some time to soften. Yamato Ishida had never been good with apologies or admitting that he was in the wrong, even if it was to the girl he loved.

"Then start talking," she commanded dryly, obviously still vexed, but willing to cooperate. "I want to hear the whole thing."

_January 30, 2003_

Roughly, he ran a hand through his dishwater blonde hair in the 'I'm too cool' way that he always did. His bottle blue eyes, which were known to make crowds of girls swoon at a single glance from them, held a perturbed look, making them seem almost lackluster. The black guitar that he could usually be seen strumming a chord on lay neglected in his lap, and he seemed all-in-all out of it for someone blessed with the name Ishida Yamato.

It didn't take long for the assorted and badly mingling sounds of random notes to dwindle to a complete silence at the lead singer's obvious troubled disposition. It took even less time for the groans of the other three band members to ensue. The bleached-blonde drummer, Izanami Kazuma, threw his drumsticks over his head in disgust, causing them to slap against the concrete garage wall and tumble to the ground noisily. He proceeded to cross his arms over his chest and kick back against the wall, his legs crossed and his feet resting on the top of his bass drum.

"For the love of God, Yamato, we're getting nowhere with you sitting around like a lost puppy and feeling sympathy for yourself," he said, an annoyed tone to his voice. "If you're this hung up over her, just go _ask _her out and put us _all _out of our misery."

"It's not that simple, Kazu. She's not just--"

"--_any girl and it's different with her,_" Suzuki Rei, their ebony-haired keyboardist imitated Yamato in a whiny manner. "We know the speech; you've only recited it a million times to us in feeble excuse for not asking her out. Just know that you're gonna lose her to some 'not just any guy' one of these days if you don't make a move soon. I've heard that jock soccer player Yagami has had his eye on her for quite a while and--"

"What!?" Yamato burst out, his gaze shooting up to the rest of his bandmates so quickly that he could have gotten whiplash. "What are you talking about? Taichi wouldn't; he's my best friend, he's my mate, he's--"

"--been totally and completely crushing over Sora since as long as you've known them," finished Takeru, the band's new bass player, wisely. He frowned before regarding his elder brother again. "Come on, you know that, Yamato. You can be pretty dense at times, but you're not _that _dense. Rei's right; Taichi's gonna get up the nerve someday and he's always been the obvious choice for her. Sora wouldn't hesitate to accept, no matter how you feel about it."

"What are you trying to say, that I don't stand a chance?" He spoke loudly and quickly, as not to give anyone the chance to cut him off again; it was annoying how much they knew about him.

"_No_," Takeru replied, his tone of voice telling Yamato that he was sick of this discussion. "I'm just saying that Taichi is going to beat you to her if you don't do something soon, and you'll never find out if you could have had something together because she'll accept him. It doesn't matter if she likes him now or not; Sora both doesn't want to see him hurt and used to have the same sort of crush on him. That'll be enough for her to be happy with him."

"Takeru, you're wrong," Yamato replied, though he had a hint of desperateness to make the statement untrue in his voice. "Sora is the crestbearer of Love. Don't you think she'd be a little more wise in her own area of expertise?"

Rei and Kazuma exchanged confused looks, but decided not to comment on it or even go so far as to ask what 'crestbearer of Love' meant. They were used to it anyway; half of the time they were around Yamato and Takeru it was like they were speaking some internet language. 'Digiworld', 'Digimon', digi-this, and digi-that; it was all so odd, but they had learned after the first few times that they would never actually understand what the two brothers spoke about.

"I'm not wrong, Yamato; stop being so daft! This is Taichi we're talking about, and not some random guy. Regardless of wether she is the Child of Love or not, the two of them have a special relationship and she's not going to be willing to break that over something like a few dates. She'd be willing to give it a shot, and she'd be perfectly happy with him. Do you know why that is, oniichan? _Do_ you? Because she'll never know that she could have had something better! She'll think that she loves Taichi because she does love him; but she only as a close friend. If she never knows what love you have to share with her--a _lover's _love--then it'll be pretty easy to get the two confused, don't you think?" the youngest boy near yelled back, frustrated. "But if you're so sure that things will turn out how you say, then be my guest to wait around forever and get your heart broken. It's not my problem and you won't get any sympathy from me when you hear from Sora and Taichi themselves that they're a couple."

The blonde sighed and stared down at the cement floor, his arms resting limply on his knees. He closed his eyes, as if in deep contemplation, and opened them again, just a short moment later. Without saying a word, he rose up from his seat and laid the guitar back in it's proper case. He snapped the case closed with a resounding 'click' and slung it gracefully over his back. "I'm going to go for a walk," he told them without even turning to face them.

Then, halfway across the threshold to the snowy outside world, he threw them one of those patented Ishida smirks and added, "Thanks, Takeru."

Sora panted as she leaned over herself, her hands supporting her by pressing on her knees. After regaining most of her breath, she looked up and smiled at the girl at the other side of the tennis court. "That was a really good serve, Megumi," she complimented the other girl. "But why don't you find another partner for a bit? I need to take a break."

The other girl nodded at her and called over one of the reserve players that had been sitting patiently on the sidelines, watching the more experienced girls practice. Sora, however, went the opposite way, to the benches. She delved a hand deep into her bag to find her water bottle, and brought it back out again, triumphantly soaking her parched mouth in the cold liquid when she had. Resting the sweating plastic bottle on the ground, she sat down herself and wiped her face off with a towel. She hated the extra heating that the school turned on in the indoor courts in the winter, because it caused her to sweat like mad, but she supposed that she'd rather be inside than practicing outside on the regular, snow-covered courts in the freezing cold. The tennis team had to practice somehow during the winter months, and this was much better than nothing.

Sora's bright red eyes swam back and forth in their sockets, following the small neon green ball between players on the court without fail. She had the tendency to be able to get so into a game sometimes that she didn't know what was going on around her, and with that came flawlessly following the ball by moving only her eyes. She was a good concentrator, that's for sure. That is, as long as someone didn't ask her to concentrate on too many things at one time.

Megumi definitely had the edge over the reserve, a new sophomore named Rin, but Rin was fighting back better than Sora would have expected a newbie on the team to be able to. Maybe with a few lessons and a better chance to practice with the other girls she would be able to make the actual team by the next year, Sora thought.

"Hey, Takenouchi," her coach's voice called, breaking through her thoughts. She looked up to see the middle-aged woman casting a thumb over her shoulder. "You've got someone here to see you."

Sora got up and headed towards the direction in which the woman was pointing to see who it was. She really didn't know who could possibly be visiting her at this time. Taichi usually waited for her after soccer practice so they could walk home together, but they got out at the same time, so he was usually there about ten minutes after she was done. Of course, it wasn't as if he wasn't always late no matter what the circumstances. Ruling that out of her mind, she moved onto Mimi, but Mimi had just moved back from America a few weeks ago and was still in the process of catching up on her work. Koushiro would be busy tutoring her, so it couldn't be him either, and all of her other friends either had practices for some activity or another or were studying or something of the like; thus, she was still puzzled when she reached the double-doors leading out of the court area. No one that she knew could possibly be wanting to see her at this time of night.

However, defying all odds, leaning against the right door frame in his usual rebel, black coat, hands-in-pockets way was a handsome blonde-headed, blue-eyed seventeen-year-old that she knew in an instant as Yamato. "Hey," Sora greeted him, smiling kindly, but still wearing a face of confusion. "What brings you here? I thought you had your band practice now and I know me playing tennis isn't enough to keep you from rehearsing the night before a big concert."

He shrugged. "I needed a bit of time to gather my thoughts about some things and I'm sure they can get along without me for one night. I make a better performer when I'm concentrated and have my mind organized than when I've got something bothering me."

"...and so you came to watch me practice? For some reason, that doesn't seem quite right." She raised an eyebrow, giving him a rather skeptical look.

"And why doesn't it?" Yamato retorted, defensively. "You're one of my closest friends; is it a crime to want to come and see you once in a while?"

She allowed a few peals of laughter to escape her lips. "No, but you see me at school every day. We have almost all of our classes together. Isn't that enough of me to satisfy you?"

"Of course not. I can never get enough of you," he replied, grinning. Immediately, he regretted saying it. Upon seeing her features enter the realms of perplexity again, he felt his cheeks heat up a bit and put his head down a little more in order to attempt to hide his pink face. It wasn't at all common for Yamato to become embarrassed or even go so far as to blush, especially when he was talking to a girl, but somehow the redhead standing there in front of him had that sort of special effect on him. He didn't know what it was, but he just couldn't say the same sort of things he said to his fangirls to her without experiencing a sort of uncomfortable feeling rising up in the pit of his stomach.

As he lowered his head to hide his own blush, Sora's ears were turning a little red as well. She assumed that he didn't notice as he hadn't thrown at her a cocky comment on how he was so smooth when it came to charming girls, but she couldn't help but try to hide it by following his lead and turning her head to the cement beneath her feet. She thought it was rather ridiculous herself, blushing over a casual comment from one of her dearest friends. She had known him for near six years now and he had never been able to make her feel like this before--okay, so she had to admit that Taichi _might_ have caught her staring or blushing at Yamato or something he had said a _couple _of times before now, but that wasn't _anything_ like this. Heh, _obviously_.

So ensued an equally--if not more so--uncomfortable silence between them while he tried to regain his poise and she her mind. Finally, after what seemed like hours, he broke it with a cough, clearing his throat.

"So..." he began and trailed off at the same time.

"So," she echoed, but more certain than he had been.

"Yeah..."

"What were you here for again?"

"Oh, no reason."

"I see..."

"Yeah."

"Are you ready for your concert tomorrow?"

"I think so. Will you be there?"

"Of course I will."

"That's good."

"Yeah.." Sora said, sounding like Yamato had about ten seconds before her.

Yamato mentally groaned. This conversation was getting absolutely _nowhere. _Truth be told, he had come to take his little brother's advice and ask her to go on a date with him sometime, but now that he was here, the whole thing seemed a lot harder than it had when they were just talking about it. _You're such a coward, Ishida, _he told himself. _Why couldn't any of Taichi's famous courage have rubbed off on you? _

"Well, there's not too much time left, so if this is all you came here to talk about, then I need to be getting back to my practice," Sora told him, motioning with her head back to where the rest of the girls were finishing up their games. "I guess I'll see you later then..."

"Wait!" He blurted it out so quickly that he didn't even know what he had said until a few minutes after he had said it. In that moment, he could have slapped himself. Some weird force obviously wasn't going to let him get away without asking her, he thought.

The sixteen-year-old turned around, looking almost exasperated and slightly annoyed with her hands on her hips. "What is it?" she asked, her tone harboring impatience. "I really do need to get back..."

The blonde gulped, visibly up a creek. He could take the easy way out and revert to his cool, composed self by waving it off with an 'it was nothing; never mind', but then she would turn around and leave without him ever having said anything. That was just the problem. He couldn't _possibly_ let her go back to that game until he had told her what was plaguing his mind. He wouldn't accept any more nights in his bed, staring up at the ceiling and cursing his existence because he was too cowardly to just go talk to her. Even if she rejected him, he wasn't going to let either of them leave those courts that night until he had asked the question that itched on his lips to be uttered so many times before...and until he got some sort of answer out of her.

As if to physically feel his newfound resolve, Yamato clenched his left fist and turned his head up to face her. "Well?" she asked, still growing more impatient with him. "Come on, Yamato, I don't have time to stand around and play games--"

"Sora, will you be so kind as to go on a date with me after the concert tomorrow?" he asked. It sounded a bit rushed, in his opinion, but he couldn't have said it any better; or at least he thought. He visibly relaxed, his hand unclenching itself and him letting out a deep breath that he had been holding in. The hardest part was over, and for that he was thankful. Inside himself, he felt a great pride welling up that gave him a wonderfully satisfied feeling. However, to make it complete he would need a good reply; he prayed silently that she wouldn't say no. Thoughts of anything and everything that she could possibly tell him rushed through his head at once, but the most prominent was the one that his bandmates had brought up before: 'I'm already with Taichi.'

"What?" she asked, looking rather astonished. However, she was almost smiling, more pleasantly shocked than anything. Well, _that _was something that she hadn't expected. Not now, at least...truthfully, she didn't think that he would _ever_ have asked her. Sure, it was something that she dreamed about hearing, but dreams oftentimes stayed in the realm of make-believe; they hardly ever manifested themselves into real life. For a few long moments, she found herself speechless, just staring at him dumbly.

His spirits plummeted instantly. Alright, scratch what he said before. The hardest part was definitely the rejection. She wasn't saying anything, and he was sure that it _wasn't _a good sign, despite the fact that he had no experience in the field of asking girls out. Blinking back an unfamiliar stinging in the corners of his eyes, Yamato turned around and began to walk away. "Sorry, Sora," he said softly. "Forget it. I'm just going to--"

"Yamato...do you mean it?" she asked, unexpectedly, stopping him in his tracks.

"Huh?"

"Do you mean what you said?" she asked, cracking a smile at his still-turned back. "Were you serious when you asked me out?"

"O-Of course I was!" he exclaimed, turning around. He could tell that by her smile she wasn't truly questioning the seriousness of his interest in her, but more like confirming it. "Why would I have any reason to joke about something like this?"

She laughed a little. "Then I would be honored to go on a date with you. I--"

"_Takenouchi!_" the loud voice of her coach called impatiently, telling her that she better wrap up her conversation before she became angry. Sora winced a bit before calling back, "I'll be there in just a second!"

Turning her body so that half of it was to the practice area and the other to Yamato, she spoke quickly. "I've obviously got to get back now, so we'll work everything out later."

All he could do was nod, imitating the redhead's dumb look from before, his mingling emotions of giddiness, relief, and suprise stopping him from doing anything but listening. She turned around, as if about to run off, but at the last second, she turned around and walked back up to him, remembering something.

"I'll see you later, Yamato," Sora said, and with a great smile, stood up on her tiptoes to gently brush her lips against his cheek. Then, as quickly as she had, she picked up her racket and ran off to join her teammates once again.

For about twenty long seconds, he stood there in complete and utter shock, until an insanely large and goofy grin took over the better part of his face. Ungluing his feet from the pavement beneath him, the rock star teenager ran off into the snowy school courtyard and jumped in the air once, with a great exclamation of happiness rather uncharacteristic to him--of course, he was never the cold and reserved rebel that he made himself out to be, especially when it dealt with her. Landing in the snow, he proceeded to laugh his heart out like he had never laughed before. Wether it was that he was letting out years of pent-up emotions and or that he was just actually, genuinely happy for the first time in his life, he didn't care. He felt like he could fly, like he was on the top of the world, and not even the strange glances he was getting from the soccer players through the gym windows could suppress it.

He had asked Takenouchi Sora out.

She had accepted.

She had _kissed _him.

Nothing else mattered.

"So spill," Megumi said, grinning devilishly as she slinked up beside her auburn-haired teammate.

"Spill _what_?" Sora asked innocently, bearing a grin that was a near copy of her friend's. She proceeded to gather her racket, water bottle, and towel back into her red gym bag. "There's nothing to 'spill'."

"Oh _please_," Megumi replied, laughing. She rolled her eyes. "You just _kissed _one of the biggest heartthrobs in _Odaiba._ As far as I'm concerned, there's a lot to spill there."

Sora knew that Omachi Megumi was one of the Teenage Wolves' biggest fans--in the sane sense, unlike Motomiya Jun and her stalker-esque Ishida Yamato Fanclub cronies. Anything that Sora could say that consisted of the names Kazuma, Takeru, Rei, or, most of all, Yamato was something of the utmost importance. "I did," Sora said simply. "And the rest is none of your business," she finished, pleased in the knowledge that the teasing was killing the other girl.

"_So_ra!" Megumi whined, putting stress on the first syllable of her name. "Come on; I'm one of your--_Hey!_ Don't just get up and leave like that! You're going to tell me what he said to you! _Sooooora!_"

The redhead just chuckled as she walked out the double-doors to where Taichi was waiting, the other girl fast on her tail.

-

-

-

-

-

-

**A/N: **

Love it? Like it? Hate it? Despise it? hopes it's not one of the last two No matter what, REVIEW it!

Just so you're aware, for the most part, this story will be following their relationship right up until the point in time that the prologue takes place. So if you're hoping to find out quickly what amounted to our dear angsty!Sora attempting suicide, you're going to have to follow happy!Sora a little bit first. The answers will be revealed in time; trust me, it's important that we see the whole story. Anyway, you didn't think I'd let you know all her secrets so soon, did you?

Eh, and if anyone's actually bothering to read this, I ask that in the upcoming chapters, when I get into some Jun-bashing, that no one bash her in reviews. I'm gonna bash her for a while because the plot depends upon it, but in all truth, I ADORE Jun. She's so spunky. =D So, yeah, no being mean to Jun. Otherwise, I'll be mad. ;

**Reviewer Responses:**

**blondie121147: **I'm trying my best, and thanks! =D

**SilentStalker: **Wow, the best prologue you've read? And remembered? Heh, I'll take that as a compliment anyway =D. And just so you know, I'm updating this fic a lot quicker than I have updated any of my other ones COUGHP&Pwhichhasn'tbeenupdatedinthreemonthsCOUGH, which is a suprise as this is by far the longest chapter I've ever written for any fanfiction.

**ishidas girl: **Yamato is only acting like that because he's both in shock and angry that Sora would do something like that to herself. The foul language needs to be understood. He's expressing his emotions in a rather vulgar way, but with everything he's feeling at once, that's the only way he knows how to do it. Anyway, yay! I get excited when my work or I go on favorites lists! That's aboslutely one of the best ways to get me to update a fanfiction, is make me feel loved! XD

**Aino Yuy aka Usagi-Hater: **Honestly, I don't even take a cruise past the Digimon section to read any of the new fics more than once in a blue moon, so I haven't noticed an uprising of the suicidal fics. ; I'm horrible. I usually just do a search for 'Takari' or 'Sorato' and read those because I'm lazy as hell. Anyway, why are you being so cruel towards Mimi? I adore her character; she's so cute, just like Jun. Oooh, I'm happy someone was left in suspense. That makes me happy!

**Ivgie Sole: **Don't know what else to say but 'thanks'! Keep reading!

**Angry Piggy: **Hey! I left someone _else _in suspense! Now I'm just gonna be giddy!

**BlueRag: **Heh, my profile does say that I like Michi, but it's not actually one of those couples that I fully support. If you're looking for Koumi in this fic, you're actually not going to find any (sorry; I like it too, but I didn't really think that it fit since I want to stay completely canon). Maybe I'll do a short Koumi songfic or something sometime, though, ne? Thanks for reading!

**Yama-sama: **Well, if I told you all that, then there would be no point whatsoever in reading the story, would there be? Eee, I love playing the evil authoress that won't divulge any of the story's good secrets. =D

**scorpion05: **Well, when you finally see it from Yamato's point of view, the breakup wasn't all that horrible, but when you hear Sora talk about it in the end and figure out how she took it, you'll understand why she felt that she had no other way out. Truthfully, the suicide attempt and this whole reminiscence of their relationship (the story's namesake) is just another step in the bigger picture, on their path to building something better. Egads! I've given something away! I just said I wouldn't _do _that! beats head on desk Bad Cael...Bad Cael...

**Jelly bear: **I shall! Be sure to check out some of my other fics too if there's anything there that tickles your fancy!

**Dark Cow: **Darling, this is by far the best review I have EVER gotten. I LOVE you! MAJORULTRAGIANTHUGEUBERGLOMP Now, you can have cookies and cake and candy and anything else you want! I adore people who give me reviews like this; it inspires me to continue and makes my time spent writing the story all worthwhile. Please keep reading and reviewing!

**christine: **Is near two weeks soon enough for you? Hee, ususally it takes me a month to write a chapter, but I've been thinking of all these nice reviews I've been getting and it sort of pushes me forward!

**S.C. Hardy: **Wooo! grabs you and dances I shall...er...go! Though, technically, I have already gone as I am writing this after having successfully finished the first chapter...Ah, nevermind. Keep reviewing!

**thetwentyone: **I don't enjoy flattering myself and sounding self-important, but this place really does need some better Soratos. I hate it when half of the stories are either horridly written or just plain cringeworthy all around. Makes me angry. It's nice to know that I'm writing one of the better ones, but I _do _sort of feel like I owe it to the Sorato fans on FF.net who are always complaining about the quality of the fanfiction (myself being one of them). Thanks, and keep reading and reviewing!


	3. Chapter Two: Of Best Friends and Broken ...

**Reminiscence**

**Chapter Two: Of Best Friends and Broken Hearts**

**By: Caelestis Dulcis**

Yamato collapsed back into his chair, breathing in and out deeply, and blatantly quite exhausted. Seconds later, a towel was thrown rather violently into his face, causing him to groan before he removed it just as violently as it was thrown and used the soft cloth to wipe off the perspiration on his face. He always attained a right amount of sweat from performing on stage, and seemed to have gotten a lot more this time. However, it was received happily for once as he felt that he had played and sung exceptionally well that night; there was something that had made him feel so passionate about the songs, more than he ever had before. Maybe this is what happiness did to a person.

When he finally removed the towel from his face, his vision was able to catch Takeru, Rei, and Kazuma standing over him with very pleased grins on each of their faces. It was Kazuma who first made a move, by reaching out and catching Yamato in a manly hug and patting him on the back madly. "Hey man, great job out there! You really blew them away!" he congratulated him before letting his fellow blonde go.

"Yeah," Rei nodded, "there was definitely something new about you when you were out there today; it's like you were completely divergent from what you usually are! It was amazing to watch."

"I think your performance inspired us all to do better," Takeru went on. "When I was watching you, I know that I really got into my own playing."

"Thanks," Yamato said, grinning. "Now, I would really love to stay around here and have you all worship me--which, may I add, you should have been doing a _long _time ago--but I have to get home and get cleaned up." At that, he rose from his seat to put his guitar away and grab his keys. He tossed the towel back to Rei, who he assumed had thrown it, as he was the only one with arms so strong.

Behind his back, the other three exchanged confused looks. "What's the rush, oniichan?" Takeru spoke up. "Why do you need to get cleaned up? We're just going partying and you can always use the showers in the dressing rooms like the rest of us."

"I'm not going partying, Takeru," he replied simply. "I've got a date tonight."

This definitely warranted a pleased and knowing grin from the ever-observant little brother. Kazuma and Rei just looked at each other, nonplussed, again. "With _who_?" they both asked, simultaneously. Rei continued for the both of them, "Just yesterday you were all smitten with Takenouchi. Don't tell me you're already going for another girl. I can't _believe _how fickle you are..."

"It _is _with Sora," Yamato replied, laughing.

The band's drummer and keyboardist gave him disbelieving looks. "Yeah, right," Kazuma said, "like we're going to believe that _you _actually got up the nerve to ask _Takenouchi Sora _out. We're not stupid, Yama. It was only last night that you were telling us that you couldn't do it, that it wasn't as easy as we made it out to be. And now you want us to believe that you did? Hah, tell me another one. You're hilarious."

"I'm not lying to you," he said, still laughing, "just ask the grinning little know-it-all over there," Yamato cast a thumb behind his back in his brother's general direction, "he'll tell you." Slinging his case over his back lithely as he always did--a movement that usually signaled the end of a conversation--and picking his car keys up off the table, the seventeen-year-old made an exit.

* * *

"Hey, Sora!" Taichi called out to the redhead as he ran up behind her, out of breath, "Where are you going in such a hurry; aren't you coming to dinner with Mimi, Hikari, Miyako, Jyou, and I?" The brunette put a hand on her shoulder, trying to catch his breath while panting out the question.

Sora truthfully hadn't known that she was running, but it was important that she got home and got ready in time for Yamato to pick her up, and she could only suppose that subconscious excitement had caused her to move her feet faster than she actually thought she was. Anyway, she needed to move quickly. It took a while to get out of this particular concert hall, with all its twists and turns and confusing look-alike hallways.

"No," she informed him, shaking her head, "Yamato asked me to go on a date with him after the concert tonight, so I've got to get home quick," she peered down into her purse to check her digivice for the time. "It's 6:52 right now and he's picking me up at 8:00, so I'm sort of in a hurry. I'm sorry if I didn't wait up for you, Tai-kun."

Taichi suddenly stood up straight and looked at her with wide, shocked eyes, and a hurt expression flashed across his usually cheerful and goofy face. "What's the matter, Tai-kun?" Sora asked, staring at him worriedly. "Why are you looking at me so strangely all of a sudden?" He visibly gulped, and she really wondered what was wrong with him. Could it have been something she said? She had just told him her plans for the night that justified her rush to get home, so what could have caused this reaction?

"It...it's nothing," he said, his voice sounding slightly strangled and not at all like it usually did, "Just...you and...Yamato? I mean..._Sora_," he spoke her name in obvious disbelief, "You could have at least, you know..._told_ me."

"But Taichi...It was just last night that he asked me and, well," she hesitated for a second, worrying about his reaction before continuing. If she had known that he would take the news badly, then she wouldn't have acted so casually about it. But truth be told, she didn't even think he would care so much to be so surprised about it. Didn't he realize it at Christmas two years before--wasn't he always teasing her in class about it--that she liked Yamato? "...I didn't think it would matter so much if I waited to tell you. I-I mean, no one knows yet, except maybe Megumi, from the tennis team--she saw it and all--and nothing is really actually official or anything...it's just one date and--"

She was cut off as Taichi held his hand up to stop her. He had his face turned to the ground, but after sixteen--almost seventeen--years of knowing him, she could tell that he was trying to fight off the stinging in his eyes with all his might. "Don't say any more, Sora," he said, his tone quiet, almost a whisper, and sounding disappointed, "you don't need to say any more."

She stood there, confusion taking hold of her cinnamon eyes, as he walked away without another word to her, and--she might have just imagined it--his shoulders slightly slumped. She watched him until he disappeared from her sight. She might have just stayed there all night, staring after her best friend in a state of lost understanding, if at that moment her digivice hadn't beeped, announcing that the hour of seven was upon her. She gasped, realizing where she had to be in an hour, and ran off the other way; and at the same time, further away from one certain brunette's life in more ways than one.

* * *

"God, Otousan, can't you pick up the laundry at least for once in your life?" Yamato groaned as he threw a pair of his father's dirty underpants from the bathroom, just one pair among a plethora of other discarded clothing items. For once, he cursed the fact that he had a band. At least then he could be home to make this apartment seem habitable _most_ of the time. He knew that his dad worked hard at the television station and that he had his obligations to the Teenage Wolves, but Takeru was right: they needed to find time to clean up once in a while.

He didn't want to just pick up everything and throw it all into the hallway where they could trip on it, but he needed a clear path to the shower, and fast. He couldn't _not _take a shower, like he would do if he were just going to sit around the house and watch TV; he was going on a _date._ Sora would expect to be impressed, and that meant him looking like he came from a home that was well organized and sanitary, not a bachelor pad-type setting.

_Well, I guess I could do some things to help matters as well,_ Yamato thought, coming across the clothes that he had worn three--no, four and a half--weeks ago in the middle of the pile. He picked them up and rushed them to the laundry room, a room that literally had cobwebs in it's corners from lack of use. He did this with the rest of the clothes, until the pile was, thankfully, diminished to nothing but a blue and white-checkered linoleum floor--_Since when did we have blue floors in here?_

Renouncing his interest in his new--new to him, old to the building--bathroom flooring, the seventeen-year-old quickly threw off his clothing--whilst vowing that he _would_, in fact, place it in the laundry room when he was out--and turned on the shower. Without wasting another second that he didn't have to spare, the blonde jumped straight in...and straight back out with a screech that no one in Odaiba would have ever imagined could come out of his mouth.

"Note. To. Self," he said, dripping wet and shivering while searching for a towel. "Check the water temperature _before _jumping in, not _by _jumping in...and make sure that when bathroom is cleared, _not _to throw all the towels into the laundry room if you're going to need one." Exasperated at his own stupidity, Yamato opened the door to the bathroom slowly and peered around the edge, his eyes shifting directions back and forth in their sockets to make sure that there was absolutely, positively no one in there with him. If Jun popped out from one of those walls while he was running around the apartment stark naked, he didn't know what he would do.

Even if she didn't have a key to his home, Yamato couldn't help but suspect that Stalker-Girl could somehow manage to find her way in. Motomiya Jun was the sole cause for the rock star's paranoia rivaling no other's when it came to insane fan girls. And with good reason; with her methods unknown, Jun seemed to appear everywhere that he was, _especially _school, when she was with her cronies, as Mimi had taken to calling them promptly upon her first confrontation with them, Ashikawa Midori and Sato Yuki. Though they weren't quite as annoyingly stalker-esque as their 'leader', they were still a pair of his most creepy fan girls and it was a rare moment when one of them wasn't snapping some suggestive or compromising picture of him to gossip over or running after him with the rest of the girls, squealing like overexcited guinea pigs.

When he was sure that he didn't see or hear anything coming from any of the rooms around him, the youngest resident of the Ishida household sneaked quickly, yet stealthily, along the walls until he found himself in that same old grungy, dusty, never-used--_Does otousan even know we _have _a laundry room?_--cleaning room. Once again, he found himself making a few good minutes of digging through the seemingly ten foot-high pile of clothing, until he discovered, at last, the clean towel from the towel rack, which had accidentally been thrown in with everything else in his rush.

_That reminds me, I have to rush! _he thought frantically, glancing up at the clock on the kitchen wall that read seven-thirty on his way back to the bathroom. As he tested the water to make sure it was neither ice cold or scalding hot, he thanked Kamisama that Sora's apartment was only a five-minute drive from where he was.

By seven-thirty five, after the quickest possible shower he could possibly take and still smell good, Yamato raided his closet for something clean that also fit--this was a task, let me tell you. It took the teenage boy a total of five minutes of searching and eighteen pairs of pants and shirts in the trash can before he settled on a nice, silk, medium blue short-sleeved shirt and a pair of black dress pants at seven-forty, abruptly followed by a hurry back into that famous bathroom to dry and gel his hair.

Albeit on any normal day it would have taken him bordering one hour to perfectly mold and make beautiful his precious hair, but he was able to pull it off in about ten minutes. Of course, he would never agree with that statement. To him, his hair looked horrible, when in all truth it looked no different than it usually did.

Critically, Yamato stared at his reflection in the mirror, the thought not occurring to him that he resembled his fan girls with his hands all over his hair. _My poor darling tresses..._ he thought, looking sadly up as them as he resigned and stopped trying to fix them. _I regret that I am forced to neglect you tonight. I hope that you will be able to forgive me..._

Dramatically, he gave a last, longing glance at the gel sitting on the counter and exited the apartment, keys in pocket, and a smile on his face. No matter what he felt about his hair, he would have a good night. He would be with Sora, and that fact alone was enough to make him forget all about the trouble that he had experienced before instantly. That fact was what made him feel like he was the luckiest guy in the world.

* * *

Promptly upon reaching the house, Sora was also finding herself in a rush to get ready. It had taken her around ten minutes to get home, and because she had left late due to her conversation with Taichi, she was home at fifteen minutes after seven, when she really intended on getting home at seven sharp. Though she didn't seem to experience all the trouble that Yamato had experienced with the shower, the real dilemma rested in finding something to wear. It seemed that she was doomed not to realize that her closet still looked like it belonged to a tomboy on the night that she needed it not to the very most.

The redhead frantically dug through t-shirt after t-shirt after t-shirt and jeans after jeans after jeans looking for anything remotely nice to wear. At one point, she pondered asking her mother for something to wear, but then remembered that the only things that her mother seemed to ever be seen wearing were kimono. Yamato had told her that the restaurant would be nice, but she didn't want to appear that formal, and kimono were just so damn hard to _walk_ in!

She discovered a couple of skirts in the first half of her closet, but they were shorter than she would have liked to wear in the beginning of February, and the only things that she ever seemed to have worn them with were...well, t-shirts. The temperatures had increased slightly since the day before and the snowfall had come to a stop while the powdery white freeze already on the ground decided to melt overnight. Thus, she knew that she could get away with wearing something short-sleeved--really, how many teenagers _didn't _wear short sleeves in the middle of winter?--but she had to find something more casual than the standard cotton tee.

Groaning, Sora allowed herself to collapse backwards onto the bed. When she hit the soft comforter, she let out a little 'oomph,' and then rolled over, burying her head in one of her white pillows.

"Sora, what are you doing?" came the soft, sweet voice of her mother from the doorway. "Don't just lay on the bed like that in your towel or you'll leave wet marks on your nice comforter. You need to get dressed now anyway, don't you?"

"Yes," she replied, which sounded more like a 'yuhsh' with her face smothered in the beddings like it was.

"Well, then get up and let me help you, and look at me when you speak to me," she chided gently, summoning her daughter up from her bed with her hand.

Reluctantly, Sora lifted herself up and made her way over to her mother, who was searching the closet with much more care than she had been before. Immediately, the older woman pulled out two hanging items and laid them out on the bed, like it had been no task at all. Sora just stared at her incredulously.

"How do you _always_ do that?"

"Do _what_? You were throwing all of your things around so quickly that you looked over the most obvious choices--and I _do_ expect you to clean up this mess. Now, get yourself dressed. You only have fifteen minutes and I still have to do your hair." Takenouchi Nozomi walked out of the room with just as much grace as she had come in with, like nothing had ever happened. But that's how her mother acted the majority of the time: calm, cool, and collected. Sora liked that quality about her mother, though, for it balanced out her own franticness in times such as these.

Once the door to her bedroom was deemed closed by the soft 'click' of the lock, she turned back to the bed to see what had been picked out for her. _I feel like a kindergartener on her first day of school with my mom coming in and laying out clothes for me to wear, _she thought, frowning. _But I suppose I have no choice. At least she kept me from spending the rest of the night raiding. _

The choice of garments that she found somewhat surprised the teenage girl. She was expecting something extremely cutesy like those sweaters that her Aunt Toyoko sent from Osaka every birthday. However, she was pleasantly astonished to discover a just below knee-length black skirt and a form-flattering red top--it was just the right length of sleeve, too, without spaghetti straps, but still remaining sleeveless.

Briefly checking the digital clock on her bed stand, which read in flashing, red letters seven-forty seven, she began to get dressed, slipping everything on as quickly as she possibly could before racing into the bathroom to meet her mother.

Nozomi regarded her daughter with a thrilled look about her, and she was unable to hide the large smile creeping up on her features. "I'm so pleased that you've been compelled to dress up like a proper lady, Sora, I really am," she said, mirth evident in her voice. "Now come and sit down here and I'll get right to your make up and--what is it?"

At once, Sora's expression turned from happy to horrified and she began to back away from the threshold of the bathroom, her hands up in front of her defensively. "M-Make up, Mom? No way you're putting that stuff on my face... Come on, that's for _girly-girls,_" she said, eyeing the bottles of cosmetics warily. "I know that I stopped dressing like a tomboy a long time ago, but you're getting a little ahead of yourself here..."

She looked back at Sora and frowned, looking just a tad putout. "I don't think that a beautiful young lady such as yourself should go around without a little on here and there at the least."

Sora crossed her arms and summoned up her most stubborn tone. This wasn't the best time for her mother to be prodding at her decision not to wear cosmetics. "If I'm so beautiful, then I shouldn't have to wear makeup to show myself off, should I? Now if you want to do my hair, I'd suggest you put that... that _stuff _away so I can come in there without fearing for my life."

Nozomi rolled her eyes and started packing the things away. "Honestly, Sora, stop overreacting. You're such a child sometimes."

The redhead did her best to ignore the fact that her mother had ever said anything and tread slowly into the bathroom, before seating herself carefully on the chair that was set up for her. Without another word, the older woman set to working on her hair, but she was stopped short when a short series of soft knocks were heard on the front door.

"Oh!" Mrs. Takenouchi exclaimed in surprise, "That must be Yamato. I'll go get it. In the meantime, I'm not done here, so take this," --she put a hairclip between Sora's teeth-- "and this," --this time, she handed Sora one of her own bits of hair-- "and I'll be back in just a second."

* * *

Out in the hallway, Yamato impatiently awaited someone to come to the door, pondering what was taking her so long. Then, right when he was considering knocking again, the door swung open to reveal an elated Mrs. Takenouchi. He had to admit, at first her appearance was slightly frightening--she seemed really happy to be seeing the boy that was going on a date with her daughter--but he decided that because they already knew each other, it was just the fact that she was glad to meet him again.

With a hand, she ushered him into the apartment. "Come on, come on! Don't be shy, Yamato, come on in! It's so nice to see you after so long, and Sora speaks so much of you lately that I've wanted a chance to see you for myself. Dear, I haven't seen you for years!"

Although he tried his best to hide the red tint creeping up on his cheeks, he couldn't help it and felt his face go hot immediately at the part about Sora speaking of him around her house. "I-It's nice to see you too, Mrs. Takenouchi," he stammered. "Uh, is Sora ready?"

"_Well_," a voice called from the bathroom, making Yamato look curiously in that direction, "I _would _be if my _mom _would stop trying to scare away my date and finish my _hair_! I feel like a circus act with all this stuff in my hands and my arms are about to fall _off!_"

"Oh, don't be so impatient, Sora-chan; I'm coming!" The woman said, giving Yamato a look that said, _'Just one second, dear; she can get antsy so easily!'_ and walked off towards her daughter.

* * *

He must have been pacing around the entryway for a grand total of two minutes--it felt like an eternity to him--before her mother was finished putting up her hair. 

When she was fully in his sights, his breath nearly caught in his throat. In six years of being her best friend, Yamato had never seen Takenouchi Sora dressed up, and now that he had he secretly wondered why she didn't do it more often. Her choice of garments showed off her usually well-hidden figure--a very _nice _figure, mind you--and the bun she had her hair in revealed a slender neck, while the few tendrils that she had let loose perfectly framed her face.

"Uh, you...you look really nice," he stuttered, a little lamely. Her blush grew, and at the same time she became infinitely more adorable in his eyes--not that he would ever voice this thought aloud. He thought that he heard her mumble something that sounded oddly like a 'thanks' before Mrs. Takenouchi eagerly pushed her daughter again, this time towards Yamato and the door.

"Come on, kids,? she said, ushering the blushing teen further with her hand. "You two should get going; don't let me keep you!"

Even though they both knew that it wasn't Mrs. Takenouchi keeping them, but rather their own nervousness, they both allowed themselves to be directed out the door. Once out in the hallway, an uncomfortable silence ensued around them, causing both to stare at their feet for quite a while.

"Well, uh...let's go then, shall we?" Yamato finally spoke up.

"Oh!" Sora exclaimed, sounding surprised at his sudden move to speak. "Yes, let's."

As they walked out to the street, where his car was parked, silence enveloped them again. Yamato mentally chided himself whilst unlocking the blue automobile, _Come on, Ishida! This is Sora you're with, not some person you just met. You've known her for _six whole years_. You shouldn't be so nervous around her. What happened to your smooth attitude, your manly charm? You never get worked up like this and you've always got a myriad of women surrounding you! _All the while, she was thinking the exact same thing--well, besides the last bits. Why was she acting like a little kid around a stranger?

"So, Sora..." Yamato began, without knowing what he was going to say. "I've...I've never been on a real date before, you know...so if I'm acting a little odd, that's why."

He mentally praised Kamisama when he heard peals of laughter escape her lips, and he visibly relaxed. "You've never been on a date? Really?" Sora asked between chuckles, which were trying to be feebly hidden by a hand over her mouth. "The great Ishida Yamato...never had a girlfriend?"

He blushed a little, thinking that he might have possibly chosen a less embarrassing icebreaker. "Well, my little 'following' asks me to marry them more than go out with them and those are almost all the girls in the school; besides you, Hikari, Miyako, and Mimi of course. So it's a little hard to find any girls that I would actually want to go out with. I guess I'm a little choosey, huh?"

"Aw, I'm flattered."

"What?"

"You said you're choosey and yet you asked me out. That flatters me."

"Well, you're not just any girl," he replied, feeling some of his confidence flow back and giving her a patented Ishida smile. "You're Sora, and you're special."

Her blush intensified tenfold. "T-Thanks..."

"So, have _you _ever been on a date before?"

"Well, once," she hesitated. "I went on a date with Ashikawa Shigeki, but that turned out disastrous."

"What happened?" he asked, a little concerned. Ashikawa Shigeki was one of the most sought-after seniors, besides Yamato himself, and he was only known to go out with other senior girls. It sounded a little fishy that he would choose a junior over the tons of other girls. Sure, he was on the boy's tennis team, so it was easy enough to tell how they knew each other, but it was still rather odd.

"I'd rather not talk about that tonight. I'm not on a date with him, I'm on a date with you," she said, with a smile back on her face. He was glad; he liked to see that smile. That didn't mean that he would completely drop the subject, but he would at least comply and not ask about it again tonight.

"I hope that I'll prove to be a better date for you then, Miss Takenouchi."

"I'm sure that you will be. He wouldn't be hard to top," Sora said with a grin as they pulled up in front of a restaurant with the word "Monsoon" hanging in front of it. She gasped and turned to Yamato with wide eyes.

"Yamato...Y-You said the place would be nice, but you didn't have to go this far to impress me!" Monsoon was a well-known restaurant in Odaiba, as well as a very expensive one. A lot of people came there with high expectations, and left amazed still. It was one of the best in the growing city. She got out of the car and still found herself gaping at the entrance. She only looked back at him when he took her hand and led her inside. 

"Yes I did," he whispered softly in her ear, a smile evident in his voice. "Now, let's get in there and not keep them waiting, shall we? I've got an eight-thirty reservation and I don't think they'd take to kindly to us being late."

Sora just nodded dumbly and allowed herself to be led through the doors subconsciously, seemingly not able to tear her gaze away from the scenery of the place. She and her mother didn't have a whole lot of money to spare between the two of them, so they only very rarely went to nice restaurants. The last time she had been out somewhere like this was actually when her father came back to Odaiba for a business conference and decided to treat them.

She barely took notice as she and Yamato were seated down in a quaint little booth and given menus. The redhead was only snapped out of her trance by the question of their young waitress. "I asked what you would like to drink, ma'am?" she said, though still relatively patient for it being her second time asking.

"Oh, yes," Sora said, a light warmth in her cheeks, "I'll just have green tea, if you could."

"Of course, and I'll be right back with those," the woman said, and smiled and walked away.

She had just begun to open her menu when she heard a slight chortle come from her companion, which caused her to look up and frown. "What's so funny?"

"Nothing, just it surprises me that you don't go to restaurants like this all the time with how refined your mother seems to be," he said from behind his own menu.

"My mother may look and act in a refined manner, but we don't have enough money to eat at these kinds of places often. My father is rather wealthy, but he rarely comes back home from his business and we only get so much money a month from him, so I'm still new at this high dining stuff," she said, smiling.

"I see. My father doesn't get too much money from his job, so we don't dine out often like this either, but I just got paid more than usual for that gig tonight, so I thought I'd treat both of us," he replied, grinning at her. She still had a blush painting her cheeks, which he thought was rather cute on her. "Besides, my otousan always said that I had expensive tastes."

She chuckled briefly. "That's funny; my okaasan says the same about me. She gets to frustrated with me at suppertime sometimes."

It was at that moment that the waitress chose to come back. The pair looked up at her and handed her their menus in exchange for their drinks. "So what will you be having?" she asked Sora.

"Goi Cuon Thit," she said, staying true to her habit of eating traditional cooking. It was something that her mother had gotten her into.

"And you?" the woman asked, turning to Yamato.

"Ah, I'll have the Thai Red Curry with shrimp," he answered, assuredly, as if he'd ordered food here many times before this occasion.

As the waitress walked away for a second time, Sora turned on her date with amused eyes. "Thai Red Curry? Are you mad? You'll need the fire department after you eat that!"

He smirked. "You obviously haven't ever eaten my home cooking."

"Why? What is it?"

"Let's just say that I can make a dish of rice feel like it just got done cooking in the earth's core."

Sora sighed, but laughed all the same. "Remind me next time that I come over to your house to make you order out for pizza."

At this, her gave her a playful pout. "Oh come on, Sora! You've not lived until you've tried my curry! Just ask Takeru," he said, remembering fondly when his little brother came over and unknowingly allowed him to cook dinner for him. Hey, he had _said _he was hungry!

They sat there like that, making idle chat for about fifteen minutes, until their food came. They then continued to chat some more, punctuated by praises of their meals, until Sora put down her fork and stared at the cloth napkin in her lap, as if contemplating something.

"What's up, Sora?" Yamato asked, frowning. Someone came by and picked up the two empty plates and he scooted closer to her in the booth, so that he was sitting right beside her.

"It's just...Yamato, have you noticed anything," she sat searching for the right word, "..._off _about Taichi lately?"

He was a bit confused by her question. "No, I haven't. Why, have you?"

"I don't know what's gotten into him..." she trailed off, sighing.

"What happened?" Yamato asked, both his curiosity and concern piqued.

"When I was going to my car after your concert, I met up with Taichi in the halls. He wanted to know if I was going to dinner with him and the other guys, and I answered that you and I had a date for dinner and that I had to rush home. Then, all of a sudden, he started acting really weird towards me, saying stuff like 'you could have told me' and 'don't say any more' and walked off the other way."

She finished and looked up at him, but Yamato was gazing at something off in the distance, obviously hit by a revelation. Sora waved a hand in front of his face. "Hey, are you in there?"

"Yeah," he nodded, finally looking back down at her. "But I think I know what might be wrong with Taichi..." _Could Rei have really been serious when he said that Taichi had his eye on Sora? Was he really going to ask her out before I did? But I didn't think... yet it has to be the only answer. She said he started acting strangely when she mentioned our date_, he thought. _I'm going to have to talk to Taichi when I get home tonight._

"You do? What?" she inquired, staring at him with wondering cinnamon eyes.

"I don't think that I should be the one to tell you that, Sora," he said, signing the bill that had been left and laying out some money on the table. "But I'll talk to him when I get home and I'll find out if my suspicions are correct."

They both rose from their seats, Sora taking his hand so that he could help her to her feet. She still had a somewhat puzzled expression on her face from their talk, but she pushed the thoughts out of her mind. "Dinner was wonderful. Thank you, Yamato," she said, smiling genuinely at him.

"Do you still have room for dessert?" he asked, that grin back on his face as he too pushed away the thoughts of their best friend. He allowed her to hook her arm in his and they made their way from the restaurant.

"Dessert? Haven't you spent enough money on me already?" she asked, somewhat shocked that he would care so much about a date with her to put out so much of his own money.

"Not nearly enough," Yamato replied smoothly as her helped her into the car, "and I know just the place that we can go."

She was left, once again, puzzled whilst he drove off towards their mystery destination.

* * *

**A/N: **So how'd you all like the chapter? Was it up to par? I hope so, since I don't want to disappoint. Never want to disappoint. Ah, in case you were wondering, Monsoon is a real gourmet restaurant in Odaiba, and the items that each of our main characters ordered off the menu are on their real menu. Excellent restaurant, though I've sadly never been able to visit. Anyway, review, my brain children, review! =D 

P.S. If you want frequent updates on my life and my fics, visit my blog (the URL is in my user profile if you click on 'homepage'). Then you'll know when I'm close to a chapter being finished, or my progress on whatever I'm working on...or just random events in my life O.o. Have fun!

**Reviewer Responses:**

**ishidas girl: **I'm glad that you think that it's sweet, but it's gonna turn out pretty damn angsty, so prepare yourself! If you know me, I'm an angst writer through and through, so it shouldn't be at all suprising. Hee.

**Angry Piggy: **Hee, godlike? Really? Now you're exaggerating. XD

**Aino Yuy aka Usagi-hater: **I'm glad that you like Jun, since she'll be playing a big part in this fic in later chapters. Mimi will be in here too, so I suppose you'll have to deal with her, hee. And you say suspense is no fun? Come on! Suspense is great! It keeps people coming back! Of course, this is easy to say when I'm the authoress and already know what's going to happen, but...

**BlueRag: **You know, your review highly offended me. I AM a Jyoumi fan, and I'm very much against being biased towards any sort of ship. You're being extremely immature and rude telling someone that they can go 'succ on dicc' because they like something that you don't. Get a life, kid. I don't need people like you reviewing my stories with attitudes like that.

**Mimi-102: **Aww, look, a new reviewer! Yay! Hey, if you want to know when I update a fic, you can always add me to your 'author alert list'. Hint hint, wink wink, =D

**LauraJean: **Hey, Lala-chan, thanks! I'm happy that you liked it! Keep on readin' and reviewin'. You know I'll always tell you first when I've got a new chappie out! Seeya on Monday, home slice!

**Yume-dream: **Cry? Honestly? Wow...Heh, that's a first. I suppose that's a compliment, so thanks! =D

**scorpion05: **Yama's not blind; of course he knew Taichi loved her. However, that was a while back and he didn't think that he _still _had feelings for her after so long. It sorta came as a wake-up call to him, if you will.

**SilentStalker: **I'm glad you have faith in my ability to update. I'm gonna try my darndest to make sure I don't go three months without an update like I did on P&P (gah, I just lost the chapter on my computer and I've got writer's block horribly). Heh ; Keep reviewin' and I'll keep tryin'!

**Dark Cow: **Jesus on a cracker, woman, how do you manage to flatter me more and more every time!? =D I so pleased that your friends enjoyed this fic as well. Keep on readin'!

**thetwentyone: **I thought once about having them just talk it through, but that would be so boring, seeing as near all of the story is going to be one huge, continuing story about their relationship. Thus, flashbacks were in order. If they were just talking about one event, I wouldn't take the trouble, but they're talking about much more, so I went ahead and did it. You know, when people put me in their favorites lists, I feel so special. People should take a lesson from you! Hee =D.

**S.C. Hardy: **returns the high-five You may be my beta now, but you've still gotta keep tellin' me what you think or you're not gettin a single review outta me, missy! Hee, just kiddin'. Thanks for the review, dahling.

**...: **Looks like you didn't get time to finish this review, but thanks anyway ;

**sorato4eva: **I'm going to try my hardest to finish it, I can assure you that! This fic has become my baby! - Keep reviewing!


End file.
